What are BLM protests about? An explanation for black Africans who don't get it

In the past few days, I have come to the realisation that many Nigerians misunderstand issues around race and racism—this is probably true for many Africans on the continent. Of course, I have always known this to be the case, but the events after George Floyd’s death and the subsequent Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests revealed the depth of this lack of understanding.

The first of many interactions was with a Nigerian girl on Twitter who was of the view that black Americans were wrong to engage in riots and looting. She used a trimmed video of a white man being mobbed to drive home her point. A longer version of the video showed that the man had charged at the crowd with a sword. Other interactions I had were mainly on Facebook, this time with two scholarly professionals—people I know personally and consider reasonably smart. One of them seemed to suggest that black-on-black crimes somehow negated the message of BLM protests: that black people not protesting black-on-black crime was hypocritical. The other thought that reports of racism were exaggerated—perhaps by the “fake media”.

Obviously, these claims have not been made solely by Nigerians (or Africans), but I am sincerely surprised that citizens of a country whose independence from colonial rule was just 60 years ago can be so blind to racism and white privilege. I have my suspicions as to why I think most Nigerians don’t understand race, racism, and prejudice, and I will discuss them in another article. For now, I shall discuss the core issues that have been raised against the BLM protests.

Black-on-black crime (black-on-black violence, black-on-black discrimination, or whatever term you like) is just crime, and, in fact, the foundations and reasons that make them seemingly rampant are rooted in structural racism. It is my belief, therefore, that even if the argument of black-on-black crime is accurate (as presented earlier), the BLM movement in its current form would still not be hypocritical because the movement aims to end structural racism[1]. More important, however, is that no one talks about white-on-white crime or brown-on-brown crime or whatever-colour-on-whatever-colour crime. These are simply and correctly recognised as crimes. To give extreme examples, the Mexican cartel or the Italian mafia kill people of their own race (at least according to the Godfather and Narcos), and white police officers even kill white people. But that is not the point.

The aim of any BLM protest is not to protest the killing of a black man by a white man—a white on black crime, to stay true to the lingo. It is to protest the structural racism that allows police officers (and other white people) to kill or harm black people. It might still be a difficult distinction to make for most people but imagine that a black gang goes to rob a bank and is engaged in a shootout by an all-white police unit. No one is going to protest the killing of any member of the gang in the shootout. In the particular case of George Floyd, the protests were about the racial structure in the society that allowed a white police officer kneel on the neck of a black man who was not resisting arrest and who repeatedly cried out: “I can’t breathe.”

“The aim of any BLM protest is not to protest the killing of a black man by a white man—a white on black crime, staying true to the lingo. It is to protest the structural racism that allows police officers (and other white people) to kill or harm black people. ”

And his was not an isolated incidence. In July 2014, Eric Garner died after a police officer put him in a chokehold while arresting him. The officer did not face charges and was only fired in 2019. Like George Floyd, Eric Garner too cried: “I can’t breathe.” Just days ago, the medical examiner’s report of Manuel Ellis, who died in police custody in March, concluded that his death was a homicide. He too was killed by the police and had cried: “I can’t breathe.” In April, Breonna Taylor was shot eight times in her own home during a drug sting. Her door was kicked down as the police had a no-knock warrant. Her house was included on the warrant because authorities suspected that a man involved in a drug ring was receiving drug packages at her home. None of the police officers involved has been charged two months after the killing.

Allow me a little digression here. With the racial stereotyping of black men and drugs, and given the disproportionate number of black men in prison for non-violent drug-related offences, one would be forgiven for thinking that the global drug cartel was run by black people. We know this is not the case. This might surprise you, although it shouldn’t: white people are more likely to deal drugs, but black people are more likely to get arrested for it. So, when the police go kicking down the door of a black woman in a drug sting and shooting her eight times, don’t just say: “But they do drugs.”

The list goes on and on and on.

When Colin Kaepernick took the knee to protest police brutality of black men, was he protesting isolated incidences of “white-on-black crime”? Suffice to say that the equation of BLM to so-called black-on-black crimes is disingenuous and suggests that BLM is simply white-on-black crime, which is a rather ignorant stance.

Similarly, the assertion that BLM protests arising from racially motivated killings are exaggerated or sponsored is laughable. To be honest, this line of reasoning does not deserve a robust response. I really do not know what to say to a black person, or anyone actually, that thinks this. First, to think that millions of people all over the globe are responding to media stimulation is to not understand how media effects work. When the “Arab Spring” began, following the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, were the riots and protests that followed creations of the media or simply to protest Bouazizi’s death? I doubt that anyone thinks that. Similarly, the death of George Floyd was the catalyst needed by an oppressed people to let the authorities know how they feel. His was the “immolation” needed to spark an overdue reaction. Thus, the protests are not only about him but also about the decades of racism and racial violence suffered by black people. I make this point so that the non-point of people like Candace Owen can be rightly binned. What the likes of Candace Owen don’t understand is that George became a hero and a martyr the moment he was killed in that manner, and his death woke the consciousness of many.

One popular condemnation of the protests was with the rioting and looting. First, most of the protests across the world have been peaceful. Violent protests are more newsworthy, however. It is therefore not surprising that media focus is placed on riots. The easy answer to the point of violent protest is that decades of pent-up anger can manifest in violence. But let’s not take the easy answer. The truth is that violence can be legitimate in the face of oppression. A Martin Luther King Jr quote describing riots as the language of the unheard is apt here. Black people have not been listened to for decades. It has been 21 years since Amadou Diallo was killed by four New York City police officers. He was shot 41 times even though he was unarmed and had committed no crime. This verse in Nas and Kanye’s song “Cops Shot the Kid” is chilling:

“Won’t be satisfied ‘til we all die.
Tell me, who do we call to report crime.
If 9-1-1 doin’ the driveby?”

Need I explain more? The social contract of individuals with society is that they will be protected by the state if they are law-abiding. But what if it is the state perpetrating violence on a particular group, not living up to its end of the social contract? Then, again, think of the psyche of the average black man who is in constant fear of his life; who is afraid of a siren. Imagine his anger on watching the video of a white police officer with his knees on the neck of a black man.

“The social contract of individuals with society is that they will be protected by the state if they are law-abiding. But what if it is the state perpetrating violence on a particular group, not living up to its end of the social contract? ”

In any case, since when has rioting for a just cause become a problem? I can understand when a white person pushes this narrative because they feel threatened. But black brothers? We know that it is not really about looted shops. Again, it is the structural racism in the United States that forbids riots by black people. We know what happens when white people riot. In 2017, President Trump, responding to events at Charlottesville in which white supremacist protesters clashed with counter-protesters, talked about “very fine people on both sides” and violence on “many sides”. 32-year-old Heather Heyer was killed during these protests when a car ploughed into counter-protesters. Compare this passive stance with his tweets on the BLM protests since George Floyd’s death. In one, he referred to protesters as “thugs” and added, “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”—a quote attributed to the late Miami police chief Walter Headley, infamous for his violent reprisals on black protesters in the 1960s. So, forgive me if I do not share your horror over riots by people whose lives it seems do not matter to anyone. Tell me what a black person’s motivation is for keeping the peace when its “9-1-1 doin’ the driveby”.

But then again, since the BLM movement started, there have been several peaceful protests. Did those lead to any systemic reforms? What was the reaction of the establishment to the peaceful protest by Kaepernick? Oh yes, he was hounded by the establishment including the president and frozen out of American football. So much for peaceful protests. It does seem that those enjoying the status quo expect black people to sit down and shut up. What is the reaction of the establishment to the current protests and riots? In a historic move, the Minneapolis City Council voted on Sunday, June 6, to disband its police department and invest in community-based public safety programs. A win for me already, a small win all things considered but a win all the same. We shall see what happens with that. Finally, as Malcolm X said: “Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you’re a man, you take it.”

Footnote

[1]It might be the case that some people will not understand how structural racism leads to Black on Black crimes. So, I will explain briefly. Because of structural racism, black people live in the poorest parts of the United States, receive low-quality education, are more likely to drop out of school, make up a disproportionate amount of prison inmates and so on. Prison is very key—children are raised without a parent, usually the father, and black ex-convicts cannot get meaningful jobs. Without a father figure or lack of meaningful employment, gangs become alluring—and black on black crimes. To pinpoint the structural racism, black men are more likely to go to jail than white men for the same crime or get longer prison sentences.